Philadelphia, PA : 2018 Champion City

Child-Centered Solutions for Philadelphia’s Youth Offenders

1,567,872

James F. Kenney

Directly Elected Mayor

4 years

Youth

The Problem

Arrested youth—2,774 last year—are held in district holding cells designed for adults, and police are not equipped to mitigate the resulting trauma or provide appropriate social services.

The Idea

The City of Philadelphia will work to make the justice system less traumatic for young people under 18 by creating new facilities specifically designed to address trauma and connect kids with resources rather than sending them to regular police stations.

What Mayor James Kenney is saying:

We’re deeply committed to building stronger supports for vulnerable young people through the Philadelphia Hub for Juvenile Justice Services, and we know our idea will benefit from participating in the Mayors Challenge.

James Kenney, Mayor of Philadelphia, PA

Our Prototyping Journey

Let's Go

How we are testing our idea

This is an entirely new way of thinking about how to solve a problem. This will be incredibly useful for Philadelphia, even beyond this project.

City Hall Staff

Philadelphia will build a physical mock-up of the space where youths would be processed through the justice system and conduct walk-throughs with justice officials, youths and families.

✔️ Test 1: Yesterday, the @BloombergCities#MayorsChallenge team walked police officers and social workers through the Juvenile Justice Hub service journey to collect feedback about the process.

Ideas into action

What we're discovering through testing

The Philadelphia team built a physical mock-up of the Hub in a school gymnasium where they role-played different interactions youth would encounter in the space. The test invited parents and young people who have experienced the justice system to respond to the proposed service. The test highlighted concerns from young people around safety and also helped the team think about what data and metrics they want to collect, e.g. tracking whether people will be accessing services after they leave.

The @PhiladelphiaGov Bloomberg #MayorsChallenge team just wrapped up their second test! Check out some of the highlights from their Juvenile Justice Hub prototype walk-through with youth, parents, and social workers.

The idea behind the Juvenile Justice Hub is to create a safer, family friendly space where people feel comfortable to reach out for support. When the team mocked up a family room where parents could meet their social worker, they included toys to keep smaller children busy, whilst their parents discussed the family situation. However, parents fed-back that they didn’t want their toddler’s in the room hearing what their sibling had done wrong. The team are now exploring other possibilities.

Young people are so excited to have a voice, particularly when it’s something that directly affects them.

Rhonda McKitten, Stoneleigh Fellow, Philadelphia Police Department

Reflections

What we've learned

The Philadelphia team initially focused on arrested youth, but during testing many parents expressed needs around housing, work and food insecurity. As a result, the team are integrating a walk-in feature into their Hub model, where residents can get information and services - making service referrals available even to families who have not experienced arrest.

A hub is a great solution, but if we can divert them even before they show up at the door, that would be a huge win for these kids.

Public Defender's office

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